<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>God's gonna trouble the water by hongmunmu</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25098784">God's gonna trouble the water</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/hongmunmu/pseuds/hongmunmu'>hongmunmu</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>One Piece</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Tragedy, Bad Ending, Character Study, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Mental Health Issues, Strained Friendships, Water 7, What-If</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 06:08:19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,841</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25098784</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/hongmunmu/pseuds/hongmunmu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Character-driven piece exploring the aftermath of Water Seven in the eventuality that Usopp didn’t survive the crew's escape.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Franky &amp; Nami (One Piece), Franky &amp; Nico Robin, Franky &amp; Roronoa Zoro, Franky &amp; Vinsmoke Sanji, Mugiwara Kaizoku ︳Strawhat Pirates &amp; Usopp, Nico Robin &amp; Usopp, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Tony Tony Chopper &amp; Vinsmoke Sanji</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>123</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. prologue</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em> I’ve been thinking this for a while now. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>“We can’t keep this up for much longer, guys, this isn’t safe—” </p><p>“Wait.” </p><p>Franky swears as he deflects another cannonball, shrapnel scattering on the deck in all directions; a piece bounces off the rail and slices open Luffy’s shoulder. Luffy doesn’t react. </p><p>“Just wait.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I get it. Just get rid of your dead weight and move on, right? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The smoke is getting unbearable, the smell of gunpowder and flame settling thick in the air around them; Chopper lets out an involuntary shriek as another shot whips towards him, only to be caught in time by Zoro’s blade, the two neat halves of iron skidding across the lawn and dragging the soil behind them. Zoro exhales, glancing over at his captain; Luffy is stood with his fists clenched, unmoving; his eyes fixed desperately on the tiny figure standing on the dock.</p><p>Usopp seems like he could be a mirage; cannons and bullets sail past him on all sides, destroying the surrounding beach; somehow he stands unscathed, frozen in time, too far away now for them to see his face. As if the marines couldn’t see him, small and brown-green, blending into the surroundings. <em> Come on, come on. </em> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> You’re always looking forward to the future. But I can’t be like that.   </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The assault rages louder every passing second; Sanji grunts at the impact as he deflects a shot aimed squarely at Luffy, cursing at him to <em> pay attention </em>as he dodges another bullet that sails past his ear and trims off the end of a lock of hair. Luffy doesn’t move, a stone bulwark amidst the chaos, the only still thing in sight as everyone else darts about, weapons firing, voices rising with the panic; on the docks, Usopp’s small figure goes down to its knees, shoulders shaking. The Thousand Sunny seems to hold its breath. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> You guys are too strong. I can’t keep up any more.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The seconds seem to slow, rendering the world to a blur of explosions and distorted voices, gunmetal-grey and black; Luffy and Usopp are clear-cut and still against the smoke, the only two people in the world. <em> Come on, </em> Zoro urges. <em> Come on. </em>They’re all thinking it, the unified hope so palpable in the air that you could cut it with a knife. The stink of desperation at the end of the world. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Luffy, you’re the man who’s going to be king of the pirates. I was just lucky to make it this far.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Whistling like a firework, a low cannonball slams into the ship’s hull and the deck tilts, incrementally at first and then all at once; the waves crash and rock against the sides of the ship in wrath, and the crew breaks out in a clamor of shock and panicked voices as they slip to the side; Robin sprouts hands across the starboard side of the ship and links them up to the mast in a chain, forming a net that Nami and Chopper fall against with relieved cries, bouncing back onto the deck as the ship rocks back upright, creaking with every sway. Zoro’s sword is stabbed into the lawn and he clutches onto it to steady himself as the rocking slowly ceases; seawater has sprayed onto the deck, rushing against the sides of his boots. Luffy still hasn’t moved, his hands gripped against the stern railing the only sign that he’d noticed the cannon hit at all.</p><p>“Luffy,” he warns.</p><p>“Wait.”</p><p>“Devil’s at the door,” Franky mutters, moving towards the control hatch. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Wherever I go now, that’s my business. It’s nothing to do with you. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>There’s two more bangs, bullets flying past; on the docks, Usopp’s head is lifted towards them, the world slowing down. The crew hold their breath and are silent; Luffy’s fingernails dig into the wooden beams and splinter them. The voice rings out across the sea like the Skypeia bell, striking into them, louder than any of the gunshots, louder than the cannons, louder than the waves. </p><p>“I’m—!”</p><p>Bang. </p><p> </p><p><em> I’m leaving the crew. This is goodbye. </em> </p><p> </p><p>The silence falls on them heavy, like a punch in the stomach. They’re in freefall, hurtling towards the impact, no one ready to brace for the cold hard ground; breath hitched, blood pounding in their ears so loud it drowns out the carnage. Deafening, deafening silence. Robin covers Chopper’s eyes. </p><p>Then Nami screams like she’s been gutted, shrill and blood curdling, and they all watch the red flower bloom on the docks, spreading wide across Usopp’s grass-green shirt. His final words are spoken in another language, gurgling out, dripping from the sides of his mouth, agape in shock, as he looks down at his chest. As always, Usopp is the last one to notice, trailing behind.</p><p>He looks back up at them, and starts to rise to his feet. Two more shots, <em> bang, bang; </em>his shoulder juts forward, bending like a scrap of paper in the wind, and then his head, a dark exit wound opening like a third eye as he sails forward, suspended in the air. </p><p>And then there is only the sound of a body hitting the water.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> So long. It’s been fun. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Zoro is already moving before the pin drops, but Luffy is quicker, snapping to action like a triggered mousetrap, and his torso is already halfway off the ship railing before Zoro’s arms wrap around him and drag him back. It’s like trying to keep a bullet inside a gun. Luffy is screaming, if it could be called screaming; it’s a raw noise like an animal, guttural and primal, a sound that chills to the bone.</p><p>“Franky,” Zoro says through clenched teeth, and Franky blinks like the sound’s dragged him out of unconsciousness; he has never looked more like a robot as his pale face disappears below deck, movements unnatural and stunted. Nami is still screaming, though the sound barely registers amidst all the other noise, the wind, the waves, the gunfire; she’s sinking down to her knees like she’s been shot, too, and Sanji descends on her like a fishing net, as if to keep her from splintering apart like the cannon shrapnel had done; his own eyes still wide and glassy. </p><p>Luffy’s teeth sink into Zoro’s forearm, without restraint, and break the skin; feral. Blood, seawater, spit, tears, all run down and slick Luffy’s skin; struggling for purchase, Zoro’s nails dig in like claws, anything, anything to keep Luffy on the ship. He is taller and more muscular but Luffy is a coiled spring of pure force, his sandals kicking against Zoro’s knees, his back arched and elbows jutting out like a rabid predator as he attempts to scrabble over the side of the ship like the ocean was pulling him down. They’re all shouting over each other, things that barely register, <em> let me go, let go, you can’t, he’s gone, we have to go. </em>No one is listening to anyone else.</p><p>Just as Zoro is about to lose his hold and Luffy slips his grasp like a fish out of water, Robin saves them, hands sprouting from the stern of the ship and from Luffy’s sides, catching him mid-air and dragging him back, covering him, pinning him down. Luffy’s animalistic snarling has descended into a wail, the exact same pitch as Nami’s, the sound reverberating around them like a dirge.</p><p>Just one of Luffy’s arms is free from Robin’s writhing prison of limbs, and bereft of any other course of action to take he just waves it in the air, clawing at the deck, raking against the boards; his fingers leave scratches and blood in their wake like a lion’s claws, and one of his fingernails break from the impact. </p><p>“Franky!” Sanji screams, the name torn from his lips like an utterance of a dying man begging for mercy; and then the sound of a heating engine rises above the cacophonous wails, and the light from the huge cannon on the Sunny’s stern wipes out that of all the Marines’ explosions. The deck vibrates beneath them, shaking their knees, and then — <em> coup de burst! — </em>Water 7, the Marines, the Going Merry, and Usopp are gone, whisked away with the wind. </p><p>Luffy’s scream shakes the heavens, and the world goes white as snow.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. the god of small things</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Robin can see the sky.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Blue. Clear. Endlessly blue. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She sits up, glancing around; excluding Luffy, the rest of the crew are strewn about the deck, lying in various states of disarray. (The first one awake, then.) The deck, for its part, is worse off; shrapnel litters the floor around them, scratches and scorch marks marring the pristine Adam-wood planks, and the beautiful lawn Franky had been so proud of is utterly scrapped; the soil is dragged and uprooted in various places, sad little clumps of it scattered around the ship from the assault, each crumb bearing a few blades of grass like sparse hairs on a baby’s head. Around them, though, the sea is calm and flat; there’s no sight of any islands as far as the eye could see, and Robin wonders how long they’ve all been out. In all directions, it was blue, clean, clear. A stark contrast to their newly christened ship.  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin sees Luffy, then, a small figure perched up on the Sunny’s massive bow; cross-legged, facing away from her, out towards the sea. The same spot he used to sit on the Merry, she observes. As she gets to her feet, her boots clicking against the deck, Luffy’s head turns, and Robin meets his eyes. Wide. Stricken. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then she remembers, and her gut sinks. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Luffy,” she says softly, breaking the silence only once she’s walked the length of the deck to stand near him on the bow. Luffy doesn’t respond, staring out to sea, so Robin mirrors him, and they’re silent for a while, that distant blue horizon the only line of communication between them, halving the world. It feels like they’re on the edge of it, so empty and still was the water, so open was the space. They could be in another world.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know what I did,” Luffy says, hiding his eyes under the brim of his hat. His voice is small and hoarse. “I thought— for a second, I thought I’d killed all of you. I just got so angry, I—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He cuts himself off, biting his lip. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m alright,” Robin reassures him, her own voice as low as his. “You just knocked us out. A new ability, perhaps.” One triggered by grief. Robin has an inkling of what it might be, but she doesn’t know enough yet to speak on it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know,” Luffy murmurs. His posture is that of a dead man. “I don’t care.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin finds she doesn’t really care, either.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>More silence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your injuries,” Robin remembers, straining to get a look. Luffy’s covered still in dry blood and dirt, the gash on his arm still ugly and raw. She can’t see his hands from here, but she imagines they’re no better off. He’s clearly wiped Zoro’s blood off his mouth with the back of his hand, but the smear remains, and somehow looks worse for it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s fine,” Luffy says, sounding listless. Robin hasn’t the strength to argue.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The others wake up not long after Robin, one by one following in her footsteps. She can see that same journey play out on every one of their faces; the stillness, the calm, the return of their memory, the sinking gut. Like her, it seems, no one can find it in them to be overly concerned about what it was Luffy had done that had knocked them all out. In the grand scheme of things, it just didn’t seem to matter at all. And besides which, Luffy wasn’t in a place to be approached about it. Like him, no one knew what happened. Like him, no one cared.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper starts crying the moment he gets his bearings, a sound that reminds Robin of an abandoned infant. For the rest of them, the sight seems to put a stopper in any further caterwauling; perhaps it was the hours they’d lain unconscious, perhaps it was shock, but either way the distance has burnt out their fuses as far raw shock went, the grief that makes you howl as you watch everything crumble before you. And in some ways, it’s worse. The real pain starts once you take the knife out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin assesses them, her crew, her splintered family who had saved her in every sense of the word, physical, mental, emotional. (All of them but for one.) Well, Robin can compartmentalise. She has decades of it behind her. Her grief can wait; for now, she’s a debt to pay.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>With gentle hands she kneels down beside Chopper and gathers him up in her arms, shushing him like a baby, one hand on his small, warm back. Nami has been sitting despondent since she woke up, shoulders sloping down and her wrists lying lifelessly against the deck, staring at nothing with her mouth ajar, like she was in a trance or dying of thirst; Robin goes to her, too, adjusting Chopper against her shoulder as he continues to cry into her shirt, and gently rests her free hand on Nami’s tattooed shoulder. Nami doesn’t make a sound in response, but her head slowly turns to glance at the hand, then to Robin, and her face starts to crumple into new tears. Robin reaches down to take her hand and help her to her feet, and then with a small nod to Franky, she guides her two weeping nakama to the dorms, and settles them down like a mother tucking children into bed. (She had done this once or twice for Usopp, before all this had started, during those times where she’d found him panicking in the bathroom, rocking back and forth on the balls of his heels for fear of whatever it was they were about to do; or alone at night on watch, too depressed to move, and like a child with his eyes on the floor he’d let himself be led back, his hand limp in hers, and quietly mumbled </span>
  <em>
    <span>thank you</span>
  </em>
  <span> as she left him.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin is trying not to think about it, she has to; or perhaps it hasn’t sunk in quite yet. She has the information; she saw what happened. She supposes, at some point, her heart will metabolise it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For now, these two needed her attention. She tries not to look at the row of lockers standing sentry at the side of the room, or the names on them. She tries not to look at anything at all, in fact.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin wishes this was muscle memory for her. She wishes she was the type of woman for whom comfort was second nature, for whom painful thoughts could be escaped by virtue of caring for others. Sitting on the edge of one of the beds beside Nami and Chopper, who are curled up together and crying aimlessly, Robin wishes she knew what more she could do in this situation besides be there and hold them. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The truth is, Robin isn’t nurturing. That was never a trait she’d associated with herself. She could be kind, she was interested in and understanding of people, but nurturing, that was rare. There was only one person who’d ever consistently brought that aspect out of her (other than Chopper, perhaps), that motherly, patient, protective woman who felt so unthreatened as to be unguarded around him, and he was now a dead body in the waves off Water 7. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Usopp had been good at that, Robin notes now. Facilitating goodness in people. Through no fault of his own, perhaps, no active effort on his part. But she’s noticed it, in Franky, in Sanji, in Nami, in herself; being around him made them lighter. Better. More sincere. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wishes she’d noticed that earlier, that she might’ve told him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was odd, now, to think about it in such a way. He’d offered things without knowing it; without trying. Perhaps he wouldn’t have felt so useless if he knew that Robin had taken comfort in his constant worrying, in his perpetual state of panic; perhaps that was twisted of her. Being around him in all his nervous energy had made her feel calm and patient; his doomsaying had made her feel optimistic in a way she had never really felt before. He hadn’t done it on purpose, but she still wanted to thank him. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You’re giving a voice to all my base fears, and making them seem ridiculous; and when you do that, I don’t feel so scared any more. Thank you for holding our fear for us. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>It wasn’t only the fear, either. Him, in all his boundless, uninhibited emotion, his heart on his sleeve, his every theatrical overreaction. The navel-gazing, the sorrow, he’d carried that for them too. Usopp had always wept for Robin, for her sacrifices, for her pain, and done so sincerely; so much so that Robin found she could simply shrug off those things that might’ve planted seeds of resentment in her heart otherwise, if unacknowledged. Painfully earnest, but so melodramatic was his sympathy that it had an effect of making one bristle to move on. As if to say, </span>
  <em>
    <span>well, I think you’ve cried enough tears for all of us, haven’t you?</span>
  </em>
  <span> He’d shouldered that emotion, too, without knowing. Usopp had caught every negative feeling that brewed among the crew and stored them inside himself, all the while never sparing a thought for his own. Despite all his cowardice, in sincerity, Usopp didn’t do self-pity. And despite all his grandiose delusionary tales, he’d never truly believed them, the lies he told.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d made them laugh, though. He’d made them laugh so much.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(</span>
  <em>
    <span>Dereshishishi.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    
  </em>
  <span>Robin clamps a hand over her mouth, and sobs. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>*** </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There is anger, coiled and unspoken, tensing under the crew like a muscle. A brewing stormcloud, dark and heavy and pregnant, warning of an approaching tempest. Robin knows this, watches it stir, this sleeping beast edging towards the morning; she knows it, but she isn’t a participant. She feels as though she’s watching it from the other side of a glass screen. Even Chopper, who can never stay angry at anyone for long, seems tense and bitter in his movements as he treats the brutal bite mark on Zoro’s forearm, rubs disinfectant on Luffy’s slashed shoulder. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin hadn’t been there during the crew’s internal conflict, wasn’t sure what exactly had or hadn’t been said, and everyone is reticent on the details; whether ashamed or finding the memory too painful, she couldn’t know. Despite all these people had done for her, all the time they’d spent together, she was still in this respect an outsider. Even Franky, their newest member, knew more about what went down the night the crew had fractured. And generally speaking Robin isn’t one to think too much of hypotheticals, of those unproductive spirals that would destroy her if she started down that road. But, but. </span>
  <em>
    <span>They’re so young. They’re hotheaded. Fools rush in. </span>
  </em>
  <span>If only, perhaps, Robin had been there. If only she’d avoided what was coming for her just a day or two longer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She thinks often these days, back to the time at G8; when Usopp had gone quiet and bitten his lip, his eyes darting away from her gaze as she tried to convince him not to rush into things. She’d seen it then, in his anxious posture, in the way he couldn’t meet her eyes; he knew she was right. He agreed. But he’d charged into the jaws of danger anyway, for Merry. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He would’ve risked his life for that ship, truly. Robin didn’t understand. But the memory of it makes her doubt her desperate hypotheticals, the wolf of her old, hopeless determinism in the sheepskin of rationality. The notion that, perhaps, her presence would’ve made no difference. That it was arrogant to think her attempts at persuasion, on either Usopp or Luffy, would’ve changed things. Especially when there were forces at play that she didn’t understand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin gives in, and lets that same old determinism crush the hypotheticals wherever they sprung. It feels inevitable, somehow, that crush. It was how she’d always survived. </span>
  <em>
    <span>These things are out of my control. I am not an agent in this. Whatever will be, will be. </span>
  </em>
  <span>She feels apologetic. She doesn’t know who to. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She thinks again of Usopp’s anxious eyes darting anywhere but Robin’s face, that nervous, sad expression on his face, the moment he knew he was going to let his nature control him again, despite the presence of reason. The moment he gave in, and turned away from progress, no doubt hating himself for it all the while. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Perhaps Robin was no different from him after all. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It was called a klabautermann.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin glances at him. Franky has parked himself on the bench beside her, leaning back and stretching his legs out, in stark contrast to Robin’s reserved posture. When she offers no response but for a curious look, he blinks, his dark gaze sliding toward her lazily. “The Going Merry’s spirit. The thing he saw on that Sky Island you went to. It’s called a klabautermann.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I see.” </span>
  <em>
    <span>Why are you telling me this? </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“You wanted to know, right?” Franky’s voice is cool, low. Neutral in tone. “About their fight. About why he’d leave over a boat.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I suppose there was never really a good time to ask.” What with openly defying the World Government, and one half of the argument’s death. Franky sighs quietly, his eyes drooping closed. The night air is cool and buttery against the skin, enough to send the occasional chill down the spine; cooler than the clear skies and still waters would’ve led them to expect. Robin shivers. “It was real, then.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If the kid was to be believed, then yeah.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you believe him?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Me? Yeah. Yeah, I believed him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin exhales, a sound halfway between a laugh and a sigh. “I suppose that makes you better than the rest of us, then.” She smiles, sadly. “If we’d believed him then, we might not be in this situation now.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky just shrugs, not taking the bait. Whether he’s the same as her regarding hypotheticals, Robin doesn’t know, but either way, it’s clear that tonight he’s not in the mood to dispute. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They sit quietly for a long time, the stars blinking overhead. Robin closes her book, and mirrors Franky’s posture, leaning back and gazing up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know what I’m doing here,” Franky says eventually. It’s not posed like a question, nor a confrontation. Just a simple, honest statement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No. But it’s too late to go back, I imagine.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky shrugs again. “I’m still here, ain’t I?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin manages a weak, weak smile. “Yes.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky’s got anger of his own, Robin can tell. Anger. Guilt. Regret. It comes off him in waves, despite his mask of composure, his cool demeanour. Like her he was an outsider to this conflict, and like her he’s an adult with a perspective on grief different from the rest, young, inexperienced. But he still had involvement, here, a personal stake in whatever </span>
  <em>
    <span>this </span>
  </em>
  <span>was. A pain Robin wasn’t privy to. An anger. Blame.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They are all building walls around themselves, Robin supposes. Rather, they are all letting the walls return. There was a point to which they had all been reaching, a tunnel they’d been running down, a light chasing, some vague and ambitious promise of a future where things were different. Where </span>
  <em>
    <span>they </span>
  </em>
  <span>were different. That focal point had leaped out of grasp again the second that body hit the water. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin isn’t angry. She is worn out, she thinks, for rage. In light of all that’s happened to her now, blame and punishment, imaginary realities, denial, bargaining, these all seem a waste of energy. She is simply numb, and aching, and tired. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin is so, so tired. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wordlessly, Franky offers her a jacket that he’d brought out with him, holding it by the collar on splayed fingers. She stares a moment, then takes it, and smiles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I worked so hard on that lawn,” he says, kicking a loose clump of soil across the deck as if to illustrate his point. No one’s bothered to clean the deck in the couple of days that have passed. “Look at it. Ruined.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s quite the battle scar, for her maiden voyage,” Robin agrees. And that wasn’t even mentioning the cannonball that had blasted into the hull. Franky huffs a bitter agreement. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Funny how small talk is the easiest thing that comes to them now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As Franky continues idly to fidget, kicking debris about with his heel, Robin’s eyes settle on the dragged grass, the potholes from the blasts, the dying strands turning yellow-brown in spots where the soil’s been too bruised or uprooted. It’s an ugly, muddy mess. Among it, though, spots of white.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Look,” Robin murmurs, softly. “Daisies.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. ones who walk away from omelas</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The days in the wake of their escape feel long and listless, and above all, quiet. Luffy is so absent he may as well have fallen into the sea after all; whole days might pass with no one seeing him. He holed up in odd places, atop the roof of the crow’s nest, inside the mouth of the stern cannon, inside the pantry. He was silent and despondent and spoke very little, if at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro is as stoic as ever. He trains in silence all night and naps most of the day, becoming almost nocturnal, as if to avoid the others. In his own bullheaded way, he is making himself scarce; in the same way that if Usopp was here, he might’ve tiptoed around the crew, holed himself up among his inventions and his drawings, skipped meals under a pretense he wasn’t hungry. Zoro doesn’t do delicacy, seemingly as a matter of principle, and so his upper lip remains stiff. He’s always been quiet, but in these new unfamiliar waters, his quietness seems more an active choice than a simple personality quirk. Perhaps it is his version of tact. For all his boorishness, Zoro is aware that there is some resentment brewing towards him, and he seems to have the grace not to challenge it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nami is less consistent. Some days, she seems like herself again, her only giveaways perhaps that she is a little snippier, quicker to rise, her patience thinner than normal; but her energy is high, like a big sister determined to snap everyone out of their rut. One morning she claps her hands out on the deck with a big smile, as if to say </span>
  <em>
    <span>that’s enough of that, </span>
  </em>
  <span>and stretches like a cat towards the sun; then spends hours after breakfast cleaning like she was waging war, mercilessly scrubbing the deck, kicking the debris into the sea, threatening to throw some forgotten possession away if whoever’s it was didn’t come and claim it </span>
  <em>
    <span>right now, I’m not playing games.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Franky had offered his help, what with Sunny being his baby, but Nami had refused staunchly and insistently, all but shooing him back into the cabin with a mop like a teahouse matron, and Franky had realised then that she wasn’t cleaning as an act of altruism; she needed the purpose. She needed control again. She needed something to be within her power.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wasn’t doing a perfect job, and stripped the varnish from the wood in some places, left soot smears in others, but Franky doesn’t say anything. As she cleans, he spends the day suspended over the side mending the wound in Sunny’s hull where the cannon blast had hit, exposing some of her inner structure. </span>
  <em>
    <span>A maiden voyage battle scar, </span>
  </em>
  <span>Robin had said, and Franky thinks about that as he fits the replacement planks, hammering them in. A battle scar. Nothing this young should have scars.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(The sound of the hammer puts him back in that dock, his secret dock, his hideaway, that sacred little place where he’d taken the kid and his stupid dying ship. Bang, bang, bang. It was the saddest fucking thing Franky had ever seen.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The memory’s clearly distracted him, putting his body on autopilot, because he misses his mark and brings the hammer down on his thumb, a blunder he hadn’t made in decades. </span>
  <em>
    <span>And damn, if that ain’t poetic. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>As Franky cursed, sucking on his rapidly bruising fingernail, he hears Nami start to cry above deck. He goes quiet, ears pricked, as Nami goes down to her knees with a light </span>
  <em>
    <span>bump </span>
  </em>
  <span>against the deck. He knew the sound of women trying to conceal the sound of their weeping, of Kokoro’s gentle sobbing at Tom’s desk while Franky lay awake in bed in the next room, his eyes straining to look anywhere but the crack of light under the door. Like then, he keeps his gaze low, and says nothing, trying to afford her that modicum of privacy in her grief. He waits until she’s gone back inside to finish repairing the hull.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The cook and the reindeer rarely separate, seemingly the only ones on the ship who don’t want to be alone; who are trying their hardest to avoid it. The rest of the crew bar Nami are isolating themselves, not interacting much more than was strictly necessary, and perhaps because of that Sanji and Chopper don’t make much of an effort to invite them in, or force them to socialise. They are the only united front on the ship, and it seems obvious that as the crew heals— </span>
  <em>
    <span>if </span>
  </em>
  <span>it heals— they are the group to which everyone will congregate, once they’re ready to be around each other again. Franky supposed it made sense. They were the caregivers of the crew, the ones whose professions revolved around other people; their jobs were to nurture and maintain. So there is usually a warm light coming from the kitchen windows and the infirmary adjacent to it, the main mast above like a huge signpost to the rest of them, a beacon to all scattered and alone on the ship; </span>
  <em>
    <span>meeting point. Confer here when ready. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Not to say that those two were ready, in any sense of the word. They just didn’t want to be alone. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He does see Nami join them, sometimes, hears the floorboards from the girls’ quarters above him creak as she leaves, padding down the stairs outside lightly like a cat, and then her footsteps fading as she heads to the rear end of the ship. Then, a door closing; distant voices. Normally they’re quiet, or at any rate don’t speak loud enough to make a ruckus; sometimes, though, Franky does hear laughter, gentle and kind. Those three were the closest to Usopp, or at least, the ones who understood him most, and so naturally they seem to gravitate toward one another, seeking comfort in what little reminders of him they had left to hold on to. They were the most childish crew members, now, or at least the most youthful; once Luffy might’ve been there with them, the source of most of the noise, his presence commanding the full focus of the others, but that Luffy now was in absentia. Without him, they are quieter, more adultlike, gentler with each other. They reminisce about adventures that Franky hadn’t been on, cry on one another’s shoulders, attempt to pool their suffering together. Franky keeps a wide berth. Whatever sanctuary they’d found was small and fragile, and he knows he’d break it if he tried to come in. His presence would dirty it for them, though they’d pretend otherwise.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Franky always breaks delicate things, without meaning to. That was why he didn’t make anything that wasn’t sturdy. He only made things strong enough to withstand him.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Usopp had been able to withstand the brute force of Franky’s emotion. Usopp, despite everything, despite his weakness and cowardice and apparent fragility, had been unbreakable.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because whatever strength and knowledge he’d lacked where the others excelled, he’d made up for it with determination; he’d take a beating and get back up again. When his small bloody silhouette had appeared at the mouth of the Franky House, a stupid lone voyager willingly throwing himself to the sharks for no real reason other than to prove that they hadn’t finished him off the first time, Franky remembered thinking, </span>
  <em>
    <span>damn, this kid’s persistent. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And Franky liked breaking things that didn’t want to be broken. So instead of humiliating him further by sending him away, he’d taken it as a challenge, and done his very utmost, backed by all his stray lost dogs, to break that kid’s spirit. He didn’t know why. Franky doesn’t like to think of himself as cruel. He likes to think he pities kids that are lost and damaged; strays. Souls left in the gutter and written off as worthless. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because when Franky had looked at his family, at these delinquents and uncouths, drunkards on street corners, kids thrown out of their homes, and kicked them all back into fighting shape so they could have a place to belong again, he’d thought; </span>
  <em>
    <span>no person is worthless. You all are rejects from the systems that keep this city going, you are nails that couldn’t be hammered in. Y’all better be damn proud of that. You’re things that this machine they call a city couldn’t fuckin’ stomach. You’re iron that couldn’t be smelted. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And they’d cheer a toast, and drink, and make merry until morning in their house that represented each and every one of them, ugly and mismatched, no uniformity, nothing forced into shape or place. And Franky had looked at them and thought, </span>
  <em>
    <span>my family. None without worth.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Possessions could be broken. Possessions were made for a purpose, and if they didn’t serve that purpose any more, then they were scrap. A ship that couldn’t sail wasn’t a ship, just like a house with no roof couldn’t be called a shelter. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But people weren’t possessions. The world forgot that. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>So Franky didn’t think of himself as cruel, no. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Usopp, well. Usopp had seen whatever it was inside Franky that had sunk him to where he stood; caught a glimpse of it, shiny and exposed, as Franky reared to attack and showed his underbelly to the prey, the only one with a view from below. That kernel of ugliness, impurity gathered over time like a kidney stone, forming hard and painful. A crystal of hurt and anger. It was a germinated seed that stemmed that urge in him, the one that made him snap pencils, lash out; the one that wanted to break things. Franky wasn’t an idiot. He knew. He’d have moments back in those days, taking apart one more pile of junk for the scrapheap; cannibalising the corpse of some well-loved vessel for all she was good for, like he was sizing up cuts of meat on a deer carcass, seeing each part by price. He’d smash and tear and sever, and stand panting over the rubble, thinking: </span>
  <em>
    <span>that felt too good. I shouldn’t have enjoyed that as much as I did. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>But he did.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky couldn’t resist challenges. He was hot-headed that way, easily goaded. Franky was a raging bull, penned up and underfed and angry, and Usopp, drenched in red, had walked to the foot of his pen and stood in the gateway, waving a Jolly Roger. No quarter. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No quarter Franky had given him. He remembers, though he doesn’t like to, remembers what he thought when he left Usopp to his untrained pack of dogs. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I don’t care if he dies. He’s finished, either way. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Usopp hadn’t been finished. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yeah. All in his stride, that journey to the bottom of the barrel and then below that, down til he hit bedrock and made a dent in it, and up he got again. He picked up his hammer and kept working. And Franky, who was a swinging pendulum of emotion, Franky who had cried for him and then laughed at him, opened his arms to him and then smashed that stupid boat into pieces, Franky had wondered, in that dock. He’d thought: </span>
  <em>
    <span>maybe I’m the broken one. </span>
  </em>
  <span>‘Cause that kid had been sturdier than Adam wood. And Franky had never apologised, but Usopp had forgiven him anyway. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Holding a grudge isn’t manly. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Like that was what he’d been worried about.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Like Usopp hadn’t been ten times the man Franky was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry,” Franky says, elbows resting on the railings of Sunny’s helm. (Yeah, well, if ships had souls, maybe the sea did, too. Maybe it could take a message.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The surroundings are darker now, the sky overcast and grey. It rains often, and the air is humid during the days; a marked change from the deep, vividly blue waters and wide open skies from whatever calm straits the Coup de Burst had landed them in. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>To anyone who cares enough to ask, Nami says they’re coasting the Florian Triangle, which would explain the slew of fog that has slowly, but steadily been getting thicker and thicker with each day that passes. Though, there’s smoke in the air that’s completely unrelated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji’s standing on the lawn deck, leaning against one of the stair banisters, lighting a cigarette. It’s late afternoon, broaching evening; the sky dark. When Franky turns around to stare at him, Sanji waves a hand dismissively; </span>
  <em>
    <span>don’t mind me. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Yeah, right. Like Franky was gonna have a heart-to-heart with the sea in front of an audience. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a sigh, after a small silence has passed, and then Sanji’s loafers tap up the stairs to the front deck, leaning against the rail. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I never apologised to him,” Franky explains after a moment. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think he knew.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That makes Franky’s eye twitch, that sentiment, but he lets it go.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Silence, a moment. Then:</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” he says, turning around, and takes his sunglasses off. “Hit me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji gawks. “Huh?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. Hit me. Men talk with their fists, right?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji glances away dismissively, and puts a new cigarette between his lips, flicking the lighter. It sparks several times before he gets it to light, each swipe of his thumb increasingly agitated. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“First, I don’t use my hands. Second, we all feel shitty enough without this. So, don’t wind me up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I ain’t winding you up. I’m serious.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji’s brow furrows, his eyes narrow in a mix of bafflement and disgust. “What would that achieve?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky shrugs. “I dunno. Get some justice for your friend. Make us even.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If we’ve learned anything from this whole experience, I’m pretty sure it’s that justice is bullshit, and subjective.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ooh. Deep.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji glares, then composes himself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He forgave you. That’s good enough for me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky snorts. “That kid would’ve forgiven any dog that bit him, as long as it let go afterwards.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That was his decision. I’m not his keeper.” Wasn’t. Wasn’t his keeper. Franky shoots back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, you sure cared about him a damn sight more than he cared about himself.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji’s hand grips the railing behind him, tense; his knuckles whiten.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If you’re looking for me to blame you, or punish you, you aren’t gonna find it, Franky.” He exhales sharply, the smoke punctuating his words. “You can’t pick a fight with me.” </span>
  <em>
    <span>Got him.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh, yeah, Franky had seen that look in their eyes. The bitter tone as they’d chimed </span>
  <em>
    <span>ex-friends </span>
  </em>
  <span>in unison, the way they’d faced their backs to each other. Franky, trussed up between them, rolling his eyes and thinking </span>
  <em>
    <span>boy, I don’t have the strength to deal with this teenage drama right now</span>
  </em>
  <span>— and then he’d introduced himself, and Sanji flipped like a light switch and kicked Franky back into factory condition. He hadn’t even minded. Felt kinda good, really. ‘Cause yeah, hell yeah, he’d play the bad guy. Franky was good at being the bad guy. And in all truth he’d probably needed reminding, too, from someone who had their head screwed on right, ‘cause things were getting weird after all that time alone. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was too easy, after their moment in the dock, to forget that Usopp would follow anyone around like a duckling if they gave him the time of day, no matter what had come before. ‘Cause Franky didn’t think much of that moment, truth be told. He’d told the kid his ship was dead. Why he’d listened to him, Franky has no idea; he hadn’t exactly done it delicately. To be precise, he’d thrown him into the fucking canal. If all it took was a stranger’s fists to snap him out of his denial, then in all honesty, Franky couldn’t say he thought much of whatever crew he’d left that tried to convince him before. If Franky were in his shoes, he’d be the last person he’d listen to. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And sure, some people responded better to force. For some people, violence was the only language they’d ever understand. Franky had met enough of ‘em to know that, but Usopp? Usopp hadn’t been one of those people. He hadn’t known the kid well, but he’d seen enough to know that much.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And someone had to punish him, anyway; he wanted out, wanted to scrub the feeling away with some old-fashioned discipline. Franky’s an old hand at guilt, at atonement, at past wrongdoings, at being the monster to blame, and he didn’t need any more on his tab. So: someone needed to step up to the plate and let him off the hook already with a good, honest beatdown. Not his family, not his house, </span>
  <em>
    <span>him</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Yeah, for all that, he’d happily play the villain. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wasn’t like it was all play, anyhow. Franky wasn’t so deluded as to think that in all those years, he’d been doing it all to punish himself. He broke things for a living, after all. He’d liked it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thinks of Nami, brandishing her mop like a sword. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I need this. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>He wants to fucking feel something. Something outside his head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I ain’t pickin’ a fight on purpose. I ain’t a sick dog askin’ to be shot.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Then what the hell are you asking?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky stares him down, their faces mirrored in matching scowls.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m askin’ you to do right by your friend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My friend,” Sanji says through gritted teeth, lifting his cigarette, “Didn’t want anything else from you. He didn’t want revenge. Don’t pretend this is about what Usopp wanted.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Franky still had muscle connecting to his nostril, it would’ve twitched, lifting his lip. He feels it then, that ugly thing inside him, beating like another heart. That streak of danger. His breaker.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, well,” he mutters, already hating himself for it. “Since when’d anyone on this ship give a shit what Usopp wanted?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They’re both silent. Sanji’s eye twitches, betraying whatever was going on under that veneer of calm. Of maturity. Of manners. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Let’s see you be the bigger person now, asshole. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Franky stares him down like he’s challenged him to a duel.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji tenses, then relaxes, rocking his head side to side; composing himself. He takes a long, long drag, holds the smoke in longer than he really needs to; exhales slow, like he’s doing a fucking meditation technique, watching the smoke dissipate in a long grey streak before the rain pummels it down. (</span>
  <em>
    <span>Oh. It’s raining</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Franky wonders when that started.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good point,” Sanji says at last, and punches him square in the jaw. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Crack.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The impact sends Franky to the floor, his balance shot, landing on his lower back. He doesn’t try to break his fall or catch himself, because hey, how pathetic would that look?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji’s staring at his closed fist, his breathing heavy. There’s a small scrape on those normally flawless knuckles; Franky’s jaw </span>
  <em>
    <span>is</span>
  </em>
  <span> reinforced with metal. Probably should’ve mentioned that, but hey, he ain’t gonna crucify himself. Sanji looks even angrier now than he had before, the tendons in his wrist tensing and untensing as he comes to terms with himself; Franky lets out a soft chuckle as he sits up, his hand going to his cracked jaw. Nothing he couldn’t mend. It’d be nice to have something to do.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good one,” he grunts, a defeated smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I did that for you,” Sanji says, steadying his breathing. He slips his offending hand into his pocket, and takes another drag, exhaling quickly through his teeth. “Don’t ask me again.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky looks at the bloodied skin on Sanji’s proud, unmarred hands, the hands that never saw combat, and thinks, </span>
  <em>
    <span>liar. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s footsteps coming up the stairs from the lawn deck, and Franky glances over, mentally cursing. Zoro stalks up to face them, one hand resting across his sword pommels, face stormy. He’s good at cornering people in silence, when he wants to, tigerlike. A prowler.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What are you doing?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It isn’t asked gently. It’s an accusation, brimming with a stern authority, a master catching his pupils in some act of disgrace. A moment of terse silence hovers over them, the three men of the crew, all daring one another; then Sanji scoffs, and flicks the remainder of his cigarette over the side of the ship, orange sparks marking its trail before it vanishes into the grey.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ask him,” he mutters unapologetically, and shoves his hands in his pockets, shouldering roughly past Zoro and heading down the stairs. Zoro lets him go, turning his thin eyes to Franky who still sits hunched on the helm, his hand on the side of his face. Behind them they hear Sanji’s quiet footsteps pattering down the flights of stairs, across the lawn deck, and then the door to the kitchen slamming shut. The lights flicker on through the windows on the other side of the ship, and then there’s quiet once more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro’s expectant gaze doesn’t waver.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“S’nothing,” Franky says, getting to his feet with a grunt. “Just pickin’ fights.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky sighs, fishing out his sunglasses from his shirt pocket, putting them back on. “Because I never told him I was sorry for what I did to him. The kid, I mean. Usopp.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro sizes him up a moment, discerning; then he relaxes, reassured the violence wasn’t going to escalate.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, well. If it helps, I think he knew.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That does it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If one more of you says that shit, I swear, I’m gonna—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He doesn’t know. Leave? He can’t leave, they’re stranded. Can’t go home, either, now he’s a wanted man. Franky isn’t used to being so mad that he can’t make real threats. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’m out of my depth. This isn’t my turf. I built this fucking ship but it ain’t my turf. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro’s eyes have narrowed again, his shoulders tense, but he doesn’t seem so easily rattled as Sanji had been. He’d been expecting this, Franky thinks. Well, he should’ve been.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Finish your sentence,” he says, evenly. Stone cold. Franky snarls, shaking his head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You know damn well what I’m saying.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky rounds on him, feeling like he’s going to explode. “You! Your inconsistent— like, what, you don’t see it? How can you forgive me and not him? If knowing someone’s sorry is enough, then what the fuck was that stunt on the dock you all pulled?!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro doesn’t flinch. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Stunt?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t play dumb. You blanked him. You threatened to walk if anyone didn’t. This is all on you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The swordsman’s eyes are like a shark’s, Franky thinks. He doesn’t blink, doesn’t react, doesn’t rise. The rain on those unbending shoulders is like a kid’s theatre version of the samurai under the waterfall. Unbowed. Upright. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Say it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Silence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Say it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>His death.</span>
  </em>
  <span>” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky was expecting something from that. The hand on the sword’s pommel had told a story, dangling like an open bracket; it implied a follow up. It implied impact. Zoro, though, doesn’t move. In fact, Franky notes— he looks young. Steel as he might be, then and there, hand resting on the swords, head bowed slightly, rain soaking his shirt— he looks young. (How old was he, again? Nineteen? Twenty?)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky has more to yell, in truth. He’d had these thoughts swirling in his head over the days since it happened, not fully-formed; just hints, unclear pieces of what was now assembled and ready to fire. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Why did you forgive me? Why could you bring me onto this ship with open arms, and leave him on his knees? Are your hearts that weak? You valued his opinion on me enough to take his word, but you couldn’t let him come home?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Could you only respect his decisions when they were convenient? </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>They’re flooding him like the Agua Laguna, these thoughts, and it’s irritating, because Franky is not typically a man who has his feelings take form like this. To solidify enough that he might translate them into words. Franky spoke in construction and destruction. He spoke in the language of men. In his fists, in his actions.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A man’s resolve was unbreakable, and right now, Franky feels like that concept was slapping him in the face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro looks humble. He looks scolded. He looks like what he is, which is a nineteen-year-old who’s just lost someone very, very dear to him. And feels responsible. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Franky knows that game, brother.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro looks ashamed.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>You talked about not playing pirate, </span>
  </em>
  <span>Franky thinks. </span>
  <em>
    <span>But you were playing, too. You were trying to be an expert when you don’t know a damn thing. Like Usopp was with that fucking boat. Like I was with Tom.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Fuck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You don’t have to say anything,” Franky says, then. He’s letting go, slowly, of the things he’d still wanted to yell at Zoro. Because right now— well. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I think he knew.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Zoro knows, too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I get it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro blinks at him, lifting his head slightly. Franky opens his mouth to speak, then stops, hesitant. Then he sits, childlike, ass hitting the deck. Zoro just stares at him for a moment, but when it becomes clear that the conversation wasn’t going to continue unless he did, he sits down too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know what it’s like. Having someone’s death on your shoulders.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro’s still quiet; they stare at each other, the tension in the air seemingly diffused. And then, stranger than anything Franky could’ve imagined— he feels his face crack into a smile. And laughs.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re like me,” Franky says, finding momentum. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t think we’re anything alike,” Zoro says, his voice reproachful. Franky just smiles, and shakes his head, getting to his feet. He pats Zoro on the shoulder, twice, as he goes. Zoro stays seated, staring blankly ahead, back straight as a board.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. We are.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Usopp doesn’t haunt the Sunny. He’d never stepped foot on it, after all. But he haunts the crew all the harder for it. He lingers, or rather, the absence of him lingers in those places he’d never been, places meant for him, that he now occupied like a grave. Franky had built him a room all of his own, a sanctuary, meant for him to grow in. Learn. Franky had wanted to help him. To teach him. He hadn’t wanted Usopp to hit his thumb with that hammer any more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The walls of his stillborn workshop were lined with blank spaces for him to fill, chalkboards to draw up plans, pads of paper that he could easily reach whenever another bright idea popped into his head, places he could capture those ideas before they slipped his mind. Nami had told Franky about her clima-tact, that wonderful thing of Usopp’s invention that he’d made to keep her safe. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Because he understood</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Nami said. </span>
  <em>
    <span>He was the only one who could understand what it’s like to feel so weak. Now it’s just me.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(They all felt weak, now.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky spends hours in his own workshop, now, holed up alone and aimless with tools held pointlessly in his hands, unfocused on any task in particular. The empty room adjacent to him seems to pulse like a wound, heating the unbroken skin around it, demanding the body’s focus. However hard he tries to ignore it, to stay present, that room calls him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>One day he breaks, and for the first time since their departure he puts down his tools, his foreign limbs; he lets his hands be idle, and hovers outside the door to Usopp’s workshop, the doorknob staring him down. He was afraid to touch it, as though it might be white-hot, like the door to a burning house. He was afraid, but he knew he had no choice. Sooner or later, he was going to have to go inside.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He opens it fast, as if he was indeed expecting it to burn him, not touching it a moment longer than necessary; like ripping off a band-aid. He flings it open, and inside, sat in the dark, is Nami, clutching onto her weapon like a lifeline, weeping silently. Her head turns slowly, her wide teary eyes glistening in the window of light cast over her from Franky’s workshop, and they stare at each other for a long, long time, suspended in clarity, that mutual understanding. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky hovers in the doorway for what seems like an eon, before at last he crosses the threshold, his bare feet on the steel-panel floors, and sits beside her without a word. He rests a hand on her shoulder, lightly, and after a moment, she leans against him and sobs, her clima-tact held close to her heart. The door left ajar between the two factories swings shut with a sway of the ship, bringing down the bridge between that world and this one, and he and Nami sit together in the dim bleak room that was meant to be Usopp’s, crying themselves out. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Franky feels an odd kind of grief for Sunny, one hard to articulate. To be hurt so badly, so soon after birth; for her maiden voyage to be one so imbued with despair and misery, rather than the hope and ambition she’d meant to represent. He couldn’t picture a klabautermann ever coming out of these desolate straits. Not without Usopp there, in all his woeful incompetent devotion, his endless, clumsy love for a thing so sacred as a home. A vessel. A guardian. A mother. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky had wanted Sunny to have that love, to know what it meant; his dream ship, the thing he’d brought to creation by his own two hands, the purpose for which he was on his earth. She was his dream, after all; this perfect, perfect thing that had existed only in his mind, and now, after all those years of wonder, Franky had learned for certain that she could manifest a soul. He had wanted Sunny to be strong enough to carry that spark of life, stronger than Merry had been, strong enough to hold that precious, mythological spirit. He’d envisioned it as the final touch, the crowning glory of his masterwork. Because what perfect ship wouldn’t have a soul?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had wanted Usopp to have a new home, too. His own hadn’t sufficed, as per his initial offer, and so he’d built one from scratch. The perfect canvas, a blank book waiting to be filled. He should’ve been here. He was supposed to be here. Sunny wasn’t complete without him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Mini-Merry, too, feels like a cruel joke now where it had felt like a hopeful promise at the time of its creation; a bright and uncharacteristically sentimental thing, for Franky at least; an apology, of sorts. He’d wanted to see Usopp’s big, stupid grin when he saw it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Now the sight of it just makes him feel sick, sat smiling and lifeless in its dock, an ugly effigy to the fact that things were wrong. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And maybe it was wrong, now, with the way things had turned out. Maybe he should destroy it. He won’t, he knows; there’s never going to be a point where he could possibly bring himself to. But he thinks he should.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because Luffy might have been the captain of the Straw-hats, but Usopp had been the captain of the Merry. And captains go down with their ships. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Nico Robin, pointedly and assuredly alive though she might be, does haunt the ship. She drifts like a ghost, unaffiliated with any one party. She hadn’t been playing the blame game from the start, ahead of the rest of them in that respect, and perhaps that was why she had distanced herself. She’d tried, initially, to be the midwife of their grief, that was clear to everyone; she was still reeling from the victory, from the high of her final and decisive freedom, and the dead weight of Usopp’s sudden death had thrown her off-kilter. She had bounced, as much as Nico Robin was capable of bouncing, between extreme highs and extreme lows. Sometimes, she could do what she so desperately wanted to do; she spoke with Luffy alone, she made Nami smile, she indulged Sanji his usual prattling with open arms; she managed to get Chopper to stop crying. She was by nature a patient woman, but the patience she had shown herself capable of in those days beggared belief; individually, she could hold them up, cover them, grab their hands and pull them back to safety when any one of them started teetering towards the edge. She was trying to show her gratitude by putting their pain before hers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And so, other times, it crumbled her, and she turned to a pillar of salt. She would turn silent, unresponsive, and vanish inside the ship; walking through it like a ghost. And if someone might pass her, in a corridor or on the deck stairways, she would walk on as though she hadn’t seen them. As though they were made of glass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>You could know where she was by her greeting; alone and idle, she seemed the same. Pensive, neutral, inoffensive, hovering darkly like a shadow. But when her head turned, she might wave a greeting, and make some passive remark on the weather, or offer a gentle compliment; </span>
  <em>
    <span>you look well this morning, </span>
  </em>
  <span>or simply and kindly smile. And others, she would be blank, and hollow, and say nothing; or she might turn cold, and cynical, and incisive.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For the members of the crew who more heavily relied on her, mainly Chopper, this would come as a personal blow, another little stab of hurt and worry; and Nami would have to hold him close, and murmur, </span>
  <em>
    <span>she isn’t mad. She’s just hurting, too. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And then new tears would be set off because Chopper felt so guilty, and so terrible, and he wished Usopp was there so they could laugh again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This hadn’t escaped Robin (nothing did, after all) and perhaps the guilt made her withdraw; perhaps the mood swings had tired her out, too, or perhaps the grief had simply become too much. Either way, she let herself step back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky, now, finds himself seeking her company; because if Sanji and Chopper were the meeting point for those of them that were ready to feel comfort again, then Robin was the same for those who had found a way to cope with the anger. With the resentment; the desperation to find something to pin the grief on. The urge to find something, or someone, to blame.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And it makes sense, he supposes. They were adults. They knew more about grief, and time, and healing. And blame. So much blame. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>On the night after he had seen Zoro— </span>
  <em>
    <span>seen </span>
  </em>
  <span>him, the truth of him, barely more than a child who had a sense of duty so strong that he had assumed responsibility for everything, and acted, as he always had done, in a way that he thought an adult should— Franky had sat beside Robin, legs kicked out, as they had done the night Robin had spotted the daisies on the ruined lawn.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He liked Nico Robin. He understood her. She understood him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Franky,” she said, her voice level. “You’re looking for meaning in something meaningless. You’re trying to assuage your guilt by seeking punishment for something that isn’t your fault. But they aren’t connected.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I thought you were a historian,” Franky had muttered. “You ought to know better’n anyone how events chain.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes. So you can trust me when I tell you that blaming yourself is useless.” Franky stared at her, and took off his sunglasses. She glanced at the floor, her face unreadable. “It’s true that you played a part in him leaving, Franky. But if he hadn’t, and Luffy had abandoned Merry there, we would’ve had no escape from the Buster Call. Or, with all that money, they might’ve thought they had a chance at repairing her, only to prolong her death until they were out at sea, with no way out. They might never have crossed paths with you, or never seen you as anything but an enemy, without him to vouch. His insecurities might’ve simply lain dormant a little while longer, only for things to play out exactly the same wherever they went next. You might’ve been captured by CP9 alone, no one to come after you, and the government might’ve got their hands on Pluton by now. I might be dead. We can whittle away the years thinking about possible futures, but the only one that matters is the one we’re in now.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ve sure thought about this,” Franky had noted, a bitter taste in his throat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know about survivor’s guilt,” she’d said simply, and Franky couldn’t think of what to say to that. So he’d smiled at her, then, and she’d smiled back. Gentle. Infinitely gentle. And he’d felt it then, that crossing of the bridge, as he stepped over the fault line. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I get it. I’m with you now.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When Franky was a kid, coarse and abandoned and still rough around the edges from living on a scrap heap, he’d tried building a bike. He remembers little of the details now, only that he had wanted to make it out of wood; he’d wanted to work with wood, more specifically. He wanted to work with something that wouldn’t cut him and leave rust in the wound. Tom and Iceburg had laughed him out of the room, because what an incredibly stupid idea it was to build a bike out of wood in a house full of metal. If you want to work with wood, make a boat, or a box, they’d said; why waste time on something unfit for purpose? Oh, sure, you </span>
  <em>
    <span>can </span>
  </em>
  <span>make a durable bike with wood, if it’s done right, and it might last you three years or so; but why would you? There’s nothing barring you from using something better. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Franky had wanted to work with wood. Taken in by carpenters, he’d thought: I want to work with wood. Something that can be smoothed, and chipped, and carved. Something unforgiving.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And Franky had gone away with clenched fists and all that childish anger (unable to understand that it wasn’t personal, that it was adults laughing at something funny a child thought or said, teasing, rather than laughing </span>
  <em>
    <span>at</span>
  </em>
  <span> the child); and tended to his wounded pride with the mantra, </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’ll show them, I’ll make them eat those words, I’ll find out the right way to do it just to see the looks on their faces.</span>
  </em>
  <span> For weeks, he didn’t stop, long after the others had forgotten about it; after the day’s work at the shipyard Franky would spirit away to the workshop and saw away in secret, all the while nursing his grudge, that little scab that he should’ve simply let heal, but instead picked at day after day, waiting for his moment of triumph, trying to prove he could do anything if he set his mind to it. And he’d finished it at least, and rode it proudly into the kitchen where the others were all sitting around a kotatsu, drinking, and shouted: </span>
  <em>
    <span>how do you like me now?! </span>
  </em>
  <span>And the adults had simply laughed, and cheered, and said, </span>
  <em>
    <span>hey, you did it! </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(And obviously, obviously, the bike broke, not long after; and Franky had cried like a baby. And Tom had ruffled his hair and said, </span>
  <em>
    <span>well, hey. You tried. You wanted to see for yourself. That’s alright. Now you know.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seeing Usopp on his knees in that dock, </span>
  <em>
    <span>bang, bang, bang, </span>
  </em>
  <span>trying to fix Merry after three separate beatings that left him near-dead, after losing his home and his crew, alone and hopeless and captive of a man holding him hostage— Franky was sent back. He time traveled. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Bang, bang. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Usopp was determined and unbreakable, but with none of the natural talent that had let Franky defy the people who wouldn’t believe in him. He was a boy who tried twice as hard but only got half as far, and Franky liked that. In his experience, the hard workers without much talent were the ones who went furthest. The late bloomers. The ones who struggled to keep up. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Bang, bang, bang. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky had grown up with good people, honest people, people who shared what knowledge and shelter they had for no reason, other than perhaps the hope that Franky might be like them some day. None of them had had easy lives; they’d fought, tooth and nail, for what they had, and it was for that reason that they gave it around. They knew what it was to struggle. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Bang. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And all around him it had been that same noise as the one Usopp had made in the dock; the strained breath in lifting heavy things, the pained yelps that followed the inevitable blunders, the sound of tool hitting material. Effort, dragging feet, things being dropped. The sounds of building, of mending, of maintaining; it was what separated people from animals, what made the ground of society, that sound. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Bang, bang, bang.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>It was the sound of people trying. </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. the sun is often out</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>sanji's chapter (chopper kind of mixed in) <br/>chapter title from this song that makes me cry every time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVqKPNlxWIc</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Sanji cooks pike for dinner again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a groan among the few sat at the table when he brings it out, setting down the plates. Not everyone comes for meals any more, more often than not asking Sanji to just cover their plates and leave them in the fridge; initially, some members of the crew had tried to skip meals altogether, saying they weren’t hungry. Sanji had let it slide once or twice; he’d lost his appetite, too, in the wake of what had happened. But once Luffy had gone a full day without eating anything at all, he’d put his foot down — </span>
  <em>
    <span>you don’t have to eat together, but you have to eat. No exceptions.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Sanji wouldn’t be able to call himself a cook if anyone starved on his watch.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The crew hadn’t all sat down together for a meal since before this had all started; not once. Sometimes only one would be absent; others, Sanji would come out to an utterly vacant dining room, his arms loaded with hot, unclaimed plates.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It had made him lose his temper, once or twice; Luffy despondently telling him to throw his dinner away, Nami pushing a piece of potato around her plate like she was hoping it would disappear. It would always make him angry, historically, but now his rage is unpredictable and unmanageable. He’d snapped. He’d shouted at a woman. Everyone had left the table unhappy, and Sanji had sat alone at the empty dining table, his head in his shaking hands, and chain-smoked. Zeff would kill him if he saw him now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The crew has all but checked out, avoiding themselves and each other, avoiding thinking about what came next. There didn’t seem to be a next. They were suspended in a snowglobe of inaction, sinking themselves deeper and deeper into their collective depression.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji didn’t have that option. Sanji’s job wasn’t one that depended on action or environment. Sanji’s job was long, and consistent, and couldn’t care less what the circumstances were. It was a basic need for survival, one that Sanji had always shouldered, and taken pride in; without him, they would die. It’s that thought that keeps him standing on the days he wants little more than to throw in the towel and act like the rest of them, sit and sulk alone in some quiet spot of the ship; it’s that thought that gets him out of bed like clockwork, each and every morning, before the sunrise. He takes the responsibility like it’s his reason for breathing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The others can’t be strong right now. Sanji has to be.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji has to be the core pillar for them. Sanji has to be the caretaker for them. Sanji has to be okay, for them. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he’s made pike four times this week.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Again?” Nami asks, her bottom lip pushed out slightly. Sanji had apologised to her after his outburst, but she was still careful not to seem ungrateful around him. Zoro, not so much. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is this a joke?” His voice is cold and incisive, but there’s that anger stirring beneath it, ready to flame accusatory in a moment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s dinner,” Sanji responds flatly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ve got to be joking.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No one’s laughing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro shoots him a look of disgust, but says nothing. Sanji looks away, setting down a plate in front of Chopper, and Nami fidgets with her fork, eyebrows furrowed nervously.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sanji-kun, maybe it’s not such a good idea to—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Abruptly she stops, because Chopper has started to cry silently, his small shoulders hitching up and down. Sanji’s eye twitches. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper cries a lot now. Anything and everything sets him off, from jokes to the sight of their Jolly Roger, and it’s unbearable. At first, it had just hurt, just a voice for what they were all feeling; they all wanted to cry. After the first week, it became tiring. Now it just made Sanji annoyed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Stop crying already!” he exclaims, slamming down the last plate with enough force to make the cutlery jump. Obviously, Chopper only cries harder in response, the silent tears going to a full wail. Sanji wilts immediately, hating himself, and freezes for a moment before crouching down beside Chopper.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t mean that,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry. It’s okay if you need to cry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper looks at him with those big watery eyes, his lip quivering, and Sanji holds his hand out, expecting Chopper to rush into his arms like he normally did; instead, Chopper just holds his gaze a moment longer, then hops off the bench and runs out of the kitchen. Sanji’s stomach tightens, and he hangs his head, hand still hovering awkwardly in the air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shit,” he mutters. Nami bites her lip and quickly stabs a piece of broccoli with her fork, not wanting to say anything; Zoro shakes his head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If you’ve got something to say, spit it out,” Sanji says, rounding on him. Zoro just shrugs, avoiding his eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve got nothing to say.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, I bet you don’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji runs an agitated hand through his hair, and curses again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll be back in a minute,” he mutters, and chases after Chopper, letting the door slam behind him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji doesn’t like how short his temper’s becoming. When he’d made his resolution to keep his head up for the rest of them, he’d pictured endless patience and compassion; the face of his mother. He hadn’t wanted his emotions to get the better of him. As it turned out, trying to bottle them had only made them worse; surprise, surprise. Now it all came out of him in bursts of anger, like a pot boiling over its lid. Sanji had never been the type to chastise others for emotion; that had always been Zoro’s territory, part of why he got on Sanji’s nerves so goddamn badly. But Zoro had been keeping to himself, his temper low, and meanwhile Sanji was here at breaking point; snapping at women and crying children. It was everything he stood against, but there he was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wonders, sometimes, with a sick stomach, if it’s in his blood. If it was his father living inside him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Judge wasn’t his father. But Zeff, too, for all the wondrous things he’d done for Sanji, for all the countless ways he’d saved him— he too was a harsh man, a man with a temper. Kitchens always ran hot-blooded. Sanji feels it sometimes, creeping up, that urge to snap; over the years it had become something he was good at recognising and shutting down before it crowned, before he let it hurt anyone other than himself. But right now he was a mess, and he wonders if he should’ve just let his despair be despair, instead of leaving it to ferment into something uglier. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wonders if that’s just something innate to men.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He sees it flash in Zoro’s eyes too, a brief and intense shadow cast across his features; that look always stood out more to Sanji than Zoro’s usual glares, because that one seemed to have real rage behind it. He said rage; in its nascent form, perhaps it was sadness, or confusion. Distress. Fear. Zoro hated seeing people cry, that much was clear.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It all came out as rage, though.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(He wonders, too, if that was what had happened to Usopp. If that unspecified period of time for which he felt weak and worthless, gone unspoken, crammed behind corners and under carpets, had calcified inside him until the tears became a fist.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji understood what it was like to feel weak. To constantly feel like he was struggling to keep his head above water; to trip and fall and watch his siblings’ backs retreat further and further into the light while he sat behind in the dirt, a failure. Left behind. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji had been stronger when he knew Usopp was cowering behind him. He’d hit harder, moved faster, sure, but beyond all that he’d </span>
  <em>
    <span>felt </span>
  </em>
  <span>stronger. He’d felt more the man that Zeff wanted him to be; not the hero, not the savior, not the white-knight fantasies that perhaps he’d let himself get carried away with every now and then. Simply a good, decent man. The way, Sanji thought, all capable men ought to be. Protecting women and those weaker than him not for want of reward, but because he should, and he could. And in Usopp’s case, there was nothing he could’ve given Sanji as reward, anyway, nothing Sanji wanted from him but his safety. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji had simply been stronger when Usopp was around. Stronger when he knew there was someone behind, believing in him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And occasionally after they’d been in one scuffle or another, had Usopp charged into danger or Sanji left him unshielded a moment and left him with some bruise or bandage to show for it, Sanji might’ve approached him afterwards, when no one was around; </span>
  <em>
    <span>sorry I couldn’t protect you. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And Usopp would just grin and wave his injury proudly (because he’d take any opportunity to try and look the tough guy) and say cheerfully, </span>
  <em>
    <span>hey, man, it’s not your job. Thanks for looking out for me, though. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The thing is, that was rare. More often than not Sanji didn’t have the balls for that kind of sincerity; instead, he’d slip into the mode of action that was so, so much easier around other men, and just get angry. (</span>
  <em>
    <span>Why’d you go running into the fight like that? Idiot. You’re lucky you got away with just that, y’know, next time they’ll take your whole dumb nose off. </span>
  </em>
  <span>To which Usopp might’ve got defensive, or gone on the offense— </span>
  <em>
    <span>aw, were you worried about me?— </span>
  </em>
  <span>and the argument would escalate, sometimes into something real, sometimes into one of the crew’s generic over-reaction theatres.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji would feel low, though, on the times he shouted Usopp down. It was weak of him, he thought, to turn to misdirected anger when the alternative was too much; when the thought of showing vulnerability, of being </span>
  <em>
    <span>seen </span>
  </em>
  <span>vulnerable was so abhorrent that he’d rather make others regret getting that close at all. That was just one more thing Sanji hated about men.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Except for Usopp. Usopp hadn’t done that. Usopp hadn’t been afraid of crying, of telling people he was worried about them, and in that sense he’d been braver and more honest than any of them. Until the day he broke.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper is in the infirmary as Sanji suspected, sat crying on his chair in the dark, his back turned on the door. The door was a little ajar, but Sanji knocks lightly anyway, announcing his presence, and goes in with soft footsteps.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Go away,” Chopper hiccups, not turning around. “I’m mad at you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji sighs, eyes dropping to the floor, and he crouches down beside Chopper’s chair, spinning it around so they’re facing each other. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay, but is that what you really want?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper sniffles and blows his nose, drawing in sharp, shaky breaths. Then his face crumples into fresh tears.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” he wails, lip trembling. Sanji exhales with a soft smile, and takes a seat on the examination bed across from Chopper, resting his elbows on his knees.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Chopper, I’m really sorry I yelled,” he starts, staring at his feet. “I was just annoyed at Zoro, and—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, Zoro was right! Sanji, you’re messing with us!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji frowns, looking up at Chopper in surprise.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Chopper, I’m not messing with you, I wouldn’t do that. Not now.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So why do you keep m—” Chopper stops to hiccup. “Making his favorite food? All the time? You’re trying to punish us, aren’t you?!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji’s startled by that, his fingers gripping at his knees.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course I’m not trying to punish you, Chopper, I swear.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maybe he was trying to punish them. In honesty, the thought hadn’t occurred to him until now. Until someone said it out loud.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Sanji didn’t think that was it.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Sanji-kun, this is like heaven, I swear. You outdid yourself this time.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>You really think so? It’s nothing special, I just grilled it with salt.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>But it tastes so good! I could eat it every day and I’d die happy!</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>It’s the most simple thing in the world. I’m sure you could make it just as good.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>No, it’s not the same… it just tastes better when someone else makes it.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Your mom didn’t make it for you before she got sick?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Nah, she hated cooking. And cleaning… and shopping. I would just go fishing and grill it outside. But there was only really pike in the river.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Aren’t you sick of it, if it’s all you ate growing up?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Maybe if I was the one making it... I’d never get sick of it if you made it, Sanji-kun.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“...I’m sorry,” he murmurs, glancing at his hands. “He said once that he wished I’d make it every day. I didn’t make it that often, since no one else liked it that much. I guess I was just… subconsciously trying to rectify that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper wipes his eyes with his wrist, fixing Sanji with a wide, teary look.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sanji,” he says softly, “It’s… it’s really nice that you’re doing that for him. But Usopp— Usopp isn’t here anymore. It’s just us.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji feels the tears well up, stinging at his eyes. It’s good. Like he’s clearing a pipe, a blockage somewhere. Chopper shuffles off his chair and climbs up to the bed next to Sanji, touching his knee sympathetically, and Sanji puts his arm around him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s just that— I don’t think anyone knows why you’re doing it. It’s making us sad, having to think about him every time we eat…” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji bites his lip, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’d rather we stomach a painful memory than just forget about him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No one wants to forget about him, Sanji. No one’s going to. There’s… there’s no way any of us could.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...I know,” Sanji whispers, and bows his head. “I’m sorry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s okay.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And I’m sorry I snapped at you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s okay.” Chopper nestles into his side, sniffing noisily. Sanji hugs him back, sighing, before opting to cut out the awkward height difference between them and pulling the reindeer up onto his lap, resting his chin on his forehead. The act of affection seems to trigger something new, because Chopper tenses, burying his furry face into Sanji’s chest, and clings at his shirt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I miss him so much,” he mumbles into the fabric, his voice breaking.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know,” Sanji says softly, blinking away his own tears. “I do too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I feel so dumb.” His shoulders tremble under Sanji’s hands. “I keep crying all the time. And I think I woke everyone up last night because I couldn’t stop, and…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s okay, Chopper. No one minds. It’s okay to cry if you’re sad.” A deflated sigh. “No one can really sleep right, anyway.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper just sniffs quietly, clinging tighter to Sanji’s shirt, his tears making a damp patch on the fabric. Sanji strokes at the tuft of fur on his head softly, and tries a different tack. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He wouldn’t want you to be sad, though. He probably would've said something like, </span>
  <em>
    <span>shaddup, you damn reindeer! I’m trying to sleep!</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper laughs in spite of himself at the impression, that small, adorable, childish little laugh, though it doesn’t last long. Humour always managed to pull him back, if just for a moment. He breaks away from the hug gently, all cried out, and knocks his feet together idly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re really kind, Sanji,” he says, one little hoof coming up to wipe his eyes. “But don’t pretend like you’re not hurting, too. I think you’re hurting more than the rest of us.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji doesn’t know what to say to that, fixing his eyes on Chopper’s ears as they twitched about. Chopper’s quiet a moment too, then hurriedly leans back in, giving Sanji a last quick hug.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay. I’m… I’m going to go ask Robin if I can sleep in her bed tonight. Thanks, Sanji.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...Okay,” he says slowly as Chopper hops down off his lap and waddles towards the door. “Thank you, too. Hope you feel better.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chopper gives him a big smile, and then he’s gone, leaving Sanji alone in the dim infirmary. As he leaves, Sanji catches a glimpse of orange hair quickly disappearing around the corner, and smiles, letting her go.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The dining room is empty when he gets back, but the other plates are gone from the fridge, so Sanji assumes the others must’ve came and went. He finishes his own abandoned plate and Chopper’s leftovers, opting to fix up something fresh for him as an apology— or as thanks. Both. He’s sure Robin has her own secret stash, but he throws in some candy on the side anyway for dessert, and leaves it outside the girl’s dorm with a note, knocking twice on the door and announcing it before he goes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As he’s making his way back to the kitchen to clean up, he spots Franky up on the helm deck, sat dangling his legs over the side of the ship, and decides the dishes can wait a little longer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry,” he begins, taking a seat beside Franky casually. He lights a cigarette and offers the pack over, which Franky wordlessly declines with a small flick of his hand. “For punching you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky snorts, that grizzled old chuckle; the laugh of a veteran. “You’re kidding, yeah? I practically </span>
  <em>
    <span>made</span>
  </em>
  <span> ya do it.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, well.” Sanji exhales, the smoke streaking off downwind. “I don’t like to get mad, so… today’s about making amends. I’m apologising to him for it, too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“To him?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Usopp didn’t want us to fight,” Sanji says. “Remember?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky laughs tiredly. “Like I could forget that dumb little face pokin’ out of a sack. Imagine if he could see us now.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He’d hate us for this,” Sanji remarks. “All this fighting over him. Conflict. He hated all that macho bullshit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nah. That kid didn’t know how to hate. Not really.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji swallows, and nods. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Nothing except himself, anyway. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky seems to think for a moment before sighing, and holding out his hand. Sanji just looks at it in confusion for a moment— </span>
  <em>
    <span>does he want me to hold it?— </span>
  </em>
  <span>before realising he’d changed his mind about the cigarette. Sanji smirks, and fishes the carton out of his pocket, slapping it into Franky’s open palm. He watches the cyborg pick one out with his comically massive hands, holding it between thumb and forefinger like a joint. It occurs to Sanji he needs a light, and he’s in the process of grabbing it to hand it over when Franky opens his mouth wide, chest tensing, and Sanji thinks he’s about to belch before a small streak of controlled flame streaks out like a blowtorch, neatly singeing the end of the cigarette. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s handy,” he says with a bemused smirk, pocketing the lighter. Franky shrugs, sucking in smoke; burning through about an inch of the cigarette in one inhale. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I ain’t much of a smoker any more,” he says, talking on the exhale, his words coming out muggy with smoke. “Body’s a temple, ‘n all that.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“A temple that you demolished and replaced with a brutalist high-rise factory, you mean.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky smirks. “Yeah. A cool ass temple.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“A temple that takes no shit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hell yeah.” Franky pauses, taking another drag, and then coughs. “Shit. Sorry about your hand, on that topic.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My hand?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky pats his jaw. “Metal. I forgot.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Tch.” Sanji exhales with a chuckle. “It’s not all that. I didn’t even notice.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ooh, fightin’ words.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m a cook. My hands get damaged by me on accident worse than your puny jaw on purpose.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Smack talk from the baker! Colour me impressed, bro.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m not just a baker.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But you do bake.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...Yes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Franky laughs, burning through the remainder of the cigarette on his third inhale, and flicks the butt into the sea.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re a good friend, y’know,” he says, exhaling through his teeth. “You’re doing a lot. Best you can, with what you got.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...Thanks?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh.” Franky chuckles, clarifying. “I meant for him. And them. But yeah, sure. Me, too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji watches him for a moment, then mirrors his laugh, the smoke streaming out with it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re one of us now, like it or not. Best get used to it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aw, man. Don’t remind me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji just laughs, and flicks the remainder of his cigarette after Franky’s, the sparks flickering down the side of the ship on their way to the water. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry,” Sanji announces, slamming his fist down on the table. He doesn’t know how, but he’s managed to score a full house in the dining room, every table setting occupied by a similarly dull, gloomy face of a crumbling family member, and he’s not about to let the moment slip. He’d locked both doors so no one could slip away while he was out of the room, and poured out everyone’s favorite booze (except for Chopper, who would just have a sugar rush in a glass) to get the tension a little less palpable. Admittedly, he himself is already a little drunk, which is probably why he feels so little shame in addressing them all like a maître-d.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve been making pike every day because I wanted to do something for Usopp, but Chopper let me know how everyone felt about it, so I realise now that was a dumb… dummy thing to do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, man, I liked all the fish,” Franky starts, but Robin elbows him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So, to say sorry, I made everyone’s favorite food.” He starts to circle the table, laying dishes out as he goes. “Franky, you’ve got gourmet burgers and triple-cooked hand cut fries. Robin-</span>
  <em>
    <span>chan, </span>
  </em>
  <span>a selection of sandwiches, bruschetta and a light soup… Chopper, it’s not nutritious but tonight is an exception, so you can have cake. But you have to eat all of this fruit, too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay!” Chopper sings, ecstatic.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nami-swan, my mellorine, for you I have roast aromatic duck with a sweet orange sauce and citrus summer salad… for the mossball, a sashimi platter with sesame rice on the side. And for Luffy, uh… well, it’s just meat.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Meat!” Luffy snatches a piece off the plate before Sanji’s finished setting it down, chomping furiously. Sanji sighs and takes his own seat, gesturing lightly to the rest of them to start; immediately the table’s awash with approving noises and various compliments, someone whining about Luffy stealing food, another hissing about being kicked under the table. Sanji smiles, watching them for a moment, because it’s a sight that he’s missed desperately, truth be told, even if there was someone missing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sanji-kun,” Nami says through a mouth of duck from across the table, peering at his plate. “What have you…?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Pike,” he answers with a smile, and sips his wine.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sanji…” Her voice is sad, sympathetic.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know.” Sanji gives her a gentle look, breaking off a piece with his fork and stabbing it against some potato. “But I thought I’d have it one more time.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nami pauses, looking at him with concern in her eyes for a moment longer; then it melts away into a smile, and she gives him a small nod.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That was nice, Sanji,” Chopper says with a satisfied sigh, as they start to filter out of the dining room one by one. “I’m gonna have good dreams tonight.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes, it was nice,” Robin adds warmly, and leans down to pick Chopper up. “Even if you did have to pen us in like farm animals beforehand.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji shrugs, smiling. “I don’t know when we’re all going to have dinner together again, so I figured I’d make it count.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Robin smiles back, her eyes soft. “Well, thank you. It was kind.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji pauses a moment, feeling a little embarrassed, but meets her gaze. “...You’re welcome.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She smiles again, like she knows something, and nods. “Goodnight, then.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Night-night, Sanji,” Chopper says, waving over Robin’s shoulder. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t forget to brush your teeth,” Sanji calls after him, wiping his hands with a tea towel. The rest follow suit after Robin and Chopper in a similar fashion, thanking him and bidding goodnight, Nami complaining that she was going to burst. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jeez,” Zoro says to no one in particular as he goes, tutting. “So dramatic.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, of course you’d find fault,” Sanji grumbles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not complaining. I’m just saying, that was a pretty grand gesture.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“All the fish I gave you was off. Hope you’re shitting all night.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Zoro rolls his eyes, not rising. “Yeah, right. ‘Night.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Night.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Luffy’s the only one still sat at the table, pressing his cheek against the wood beside his plate, drawing circles in the leftover sauce with his finger. Sanji takes the plate away before he makes a mess, eliciting a whine.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s the matter?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Still hungry,” Luffy mumbles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, figures. That’s why I made you two more plates.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...Oh.” He sounds uninterested. “Really?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No. But that reaction told me you’re not still hungry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Luffy groans, rolling his head over to crush his face flat against the table; Sanji takes a seat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Y’know, food can’t fix everything,” he says, handing Luffy a napkin. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Normally it does. Normally meat makes me feel better. But I feel worse.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji sighs, scratching idly at his jaw. He knew all too well what that felt like, but Luffy wasn’t good at dealing with negative emotions; this was the most normal Sanji had seen him in… well, since it happened. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You seemed happy at dinner,” he offers lightly, hopeful. Luffy rolls back onto his cheek, picking at the grain in the wood with one idle finger.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think I was pretending.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji blinks, surprised. “I didn’t think you could pretend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know.” Luffy exhales, continuing to fidget. “It’s not like I was faking. It’s just… easier. I don’t know how I’d act at dinner, if I didn’t act like that. I just wouldn’t have come.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sorry for making you come,” Sanji says weakly. “I didn’t want to make things worse.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You didn’t. It was tasty. Everyone was happy. It was good.” Luffy’s face is stone. “It hurts.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji watches Luffy’s finger as it digs in and out of the wood’s grooves, and sighs. He pulls out his cigarettes, and lights one.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I know.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Luffy sighs, and gets to his feet like a corpse, arms limp at his sides.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Goodnight, Sanji,” he says, and he goes, placing one hand on Sanji’s shoulder as he passes. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Sanji understands. The night had been an act on everyone’s part; a brief respite from the tireless monotony of grief. At some point, suffering became exhausting. You wanted it to stop. So they had all pretended, for a couple of hours; they had all exaggerated their every reaction, their sincerity, their happiness. Playing house, where once they had simply been house. It was forced, everyone could see, squinting through their drunkenness. Nami’s laugh was a little too high and a little too loud; Zoro’s smile didn’t extend to his eyes. Through the warm orange glow of evening, it had felt real enough, though. If you shine a harsh light on anything, the cracks will start to show, just as sure as the wood grain in the table’s surface now had trapped droplets of sauce in it, darkening the pattern.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Usopp had loved to overreact, though, loved to exaggerate. It was almost like he couldn’t understand nuances, or perhaps he’d understood them so well that it scared him. He preferred things to be cartoon-like, loud, colourful; spelled out in theatrics, like how you taught emotion to toddlers by hugely overperforming every one. Usopp laughed way too loud and way too easily, at virtually any joke; he’d screamed and enacted panic even when sometimes, Sanji thought, he probably wasn’t even really that scared. Force of habit. He did it because he wanted others to do it, too; he provoked, annoyed Zoro on purpose even when he knew it’d get him chased around the ship for an hour, talked Nami’s ear off about his own imaginary achievements until she got bored and slapped him; stole spices from the pantry or hid inside a cupboard just to jump out and scare Sanji.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In truth, Sanji had stopped being surprised by Usopp’s pranks after pretty much a day of knowing him. But he’d still jump, shout, pretend to be angry and chase Usopp around the ship while the latter half-giggled, half-shrieked in terror. Usopp liked reactions. He was scared of being ignored. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sanji supposes that’s why, as Nami had told him, Usopp had relentlessly spent every day of his youth purposefully drawing the ire of his entire village, calling catastrophe, vandalising their houses (</span>
  <em>
    <span>Usopp-was-here) </span>
  </em>
  <span>even when they chased him down with sticks and bats, saying each time that it was the final straw. Even that sort of treatment, to him, was preferable to being forgotten. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A compulsion. Like watching a fly crash into a glass window over and over again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>So Sanji had played along. Like a lighthouse, signing back to a ship lost out on the waves.</span>
  <em>
    <span> I am here</span>
  </em>
  <span>, the ship’s signal blinked, flashing again and again into the dark, bellowing into the void for anyone who could hear; </span>
  <em>
    <span>I exist</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>I know</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Sanji had blinked back. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I can see you. It’s alright</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>endless thanks to tony for beta-reading this for me, and YOU for reading it!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>